New images of Black Mountain Orchids

These images were taken on Black Mountain last weekend. I am grateful to Martin Butterfield and Tony Wood for arranging to meet me at Black Mountain, (ACT) and to show me where these particular plants are found. These are all plants I have not photographed properly before (I have seen the Little Duck Orchid in pouring rain at Lithgow, but the photos were barely recognisable.) The Black Tongued Stegostyla and the Large Bird Orchid are totally new species for me.

Little Duck Orchid
Paracaleana minor

You might like to compare this species with the closely related Flying Duck Orchid, Caleana major.

Little Duck Orchid
Paracaleana minor
Front view of the Orchid and column and pollinia.

leaf of Little Duck Orchid
Paracaleana minor

Oligochaetochilus rufus
Rustyhood Orchid - front view

This species of the "rufa group" (or Rustyhoods) (originally in the Pterostylis group) is flowering considerably later than other "Rustyhoods".

Oligochaetochilus rufus
Rustyhood Orchid - side view

Simpliglottis valida
Large Bird Orchid

This is the first time I have seen this species of Large Bird Orchid (Simpliglottis valida). You can contrast this species with the local "Illawarra Bird Orchid" Simpliglottis chlorantha - which is primarily an all-green flower. Similar in structure, with subtle differences in the gland structure.

Simpliglottis valida
Large Bird Orchid
Note large "osmophores" glands.
(Click on image to enlarge)

This large pink "non-Caladenia" as Martin refers to them, is a striking plant. It was growing amongst tussocks of native grasses high on the eastern side of Black Mountain - overlooking Canberra's Civic Centre. I was anticipating it to be a small "Ladies Fingers Orchid", but the flowers were far larger and far taller than I was expecting.

Stegostyla congesta
Black-tongue Orchid

The labellum of this Orchid is very distinctive, with its "calli" (glands) packed densely all over the lebellum. The entire plant is covered with fine bristles.

Stegostyla congesta
Black-tongue Orchid

As wet as Little Ducks

It seems to me that little Duck Orchids love to flower in the rain. The only times I have seen them, that has been the case. 2 out of 2 = 100%. I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

I first saw these Small Duck Orchids (Caleana minor, or Paracaleana minor, or  Sullivania minor) at Lithgow, on a very wet weekend which began what we now realise was the start of our wet summer season. Chris Jonkers kindly sent me photos of this Orchid, in late December (when there was a break in the wet weather).

Small Duck Orchid, Vincentia, 9 Jan 2011

 This weekend, with Colin and Mischa Rowan, Alan Stephenson and Kirsten - all members of Illawarra Branch of ANOS - I went to Vincentia - in the pouring rain. Where these plants are growing is on a small area of sandstone heath country and moss gardens, on an exposed rock shelf. After heavy rain the water was pouring off the hillside behind us, and so to photograph these Orchids required lying face down in the wet moss beds and trying to peer through a misted-up view finder. The same problems I had up in Lithgow all those weeks ago.

Small Duck Orchid - in the rain

Duck by name, Duck by nature. I reckon these flowers love the rain.
I know I don't, and my camera doesn't.

Small Flying Duck Orchid

This is both a descriptive title and the "proper name" of an unusual Orchid which I saw when on a trip to Lithgow with the RiversSOS people. I have previously reported on several other rare plants I saw on that trip - Grevillea acanthifolia and also the Pagoda Rock Daisy.


What I was not able to adequately report at the time was that Louise, from the Lithgow Environment Group, who I was with on that wet and soggy tour of cracked cliff edges and the Pagodas, mentioned that she had spotted some "small Orchids - about 3 inches high". I immediately leapt out of the car, to go back with her, as I knew that it was way past the flowering season of most small Orchids, such as the "Caladenias". So any Orchid in flower up there which was as small as she said was likely to be "unusual".

My mistake was to not take my "Macro Lens" with me, so the images I managed to take through the fogged-up camera lens, while peering through my rain-spotted glasses, were barely recognisable. But I could see that in fact they were of the "Small Flying Duck Orchid". Sullivania minor (formerly Paracaleana minor).

That is a plant I had never seen before.


Since that weekend, I have been tied up with building work, and then it has been raining heavily. The site was on a really awkward-to-access Forestry Trail on the hills beyond Lithgow, and the road was bad enough in reasonable weather, but it has been bucketing down frequently since that weekend. So, I did not trust my energy levels, and my navigation skills, and Mud-Bashing driving technique enough to make the trip back to Lithgow (about 4 hours from Robertson). So I had made the resolve to "get back there another year, in late November".


Well, fortunately, Chris Jonkers (from Lithgow) who was leading that Rivers SOS tour that wet afternoon, has managed to get back to the exact spot where Louise saw those little orchids and has kindly sent me some images. I know he tried at least once without finding these Small Flying Duck Orchids, but he did find some of the regular (and much taller) "Flying Duck Orchids". In the process of that trip, Chris clearly got a drenching for his troubles. But he went back yet again to find the spot Louise had told him about - this time with success.


Several days ago Chris sent me these photos.

Small Flying Duck Orchid 

(Image courtesy Chris Jonkers)

Sullivania minor (Image C. Jonkers)

 Small Flying Duck Orchid

Head down (triggered closed)

Sullivania minor (Image C. Jonkers)

Those two images serve to show the similarities and some differences between this species and the regular Flying Duck Orchid (Caleana major).

Caleana major holds the "wings" back

and its entire flower is poised more vertically.

The "head" is well rounded, and smooth in texture.

Flying Duck Orchid - Caleana major
Photo: Denis Wilson

 By contrast, the Small Flying Duck Orchid 

holds the "wings" down beside the flower

and the head is distinctly "warty".

I should mention that the body is green

and of course, there is the matter of the height.

 

Sullivania minor (Image C. Jonkers)

This Species is a mere 100 mm high, whereas the regular Flying Duck Orchid stands about four times as tall as that (350 mm to 400 mm approx.)